Other Worlds
by Alis Volat Propris
Summary: He hadn't meant to feel this way about her, but he supposed it was inevitable. He had to continue to put one foot in front of the other and every step led him further to his goals. He was surprised however, when she followed suit. Sasu/Karin fic lets


AN: It had to happen. Yes. I _like _Karin and I actually hate Sakura right now due to kishi's more recent chapters, and really Sakura needs some healthy competition, so I have fallen into the SasuKarin pairing. Laugh if you will but remember dear reviewers that Sakura was useless once, and currently is becoming useless again. Flames will be met with laughter, because you're pathetic enough to leave hate mail on a FANFIC for pete sakes, so that must mean you must feel insecure and threatened by it.

PS. this will probably contain drabbles of any Sasu Karin I write.

Music of the Update: Rihanna "Push up on me"

Karin sat on the white cube structures, constantly checking on Sasuke's vitals. His breath was stagnant, a fact that worried her. Karin was no medic nin, but even she knew when things were bad. She bit her lip, frowning as she waited. They were in some sort of conjured world of Madara's. He'd told her to watch over Sasuke and to heal him. Sasuke had yet to wake up. Karin adjusted her glasses with a sigh. A choking cough interrupted her thoughts.

"Sasuke!" Karin cried, as those black irises, darker than any black she'd ever seen blinked open. Karin helped him to sit up as he leaned against her, using her arm to hold him as he trembled.

"Here, you need-" Karin began to roll up her sleeve.

"Where...are we?" Sasuke asked looking around.

"We're somewhere Madara sent us. I guess it's something like an alternate world, only it's built out of chakra"

Sasuke trembled as he choked, coughing.

"Sasuke, please...you need to.." Karin blushed as she unbuttoned her collar unable to finish the words.

Ensuring her modesty was intact, she placed Sasuke's head near her collarbone, situating him over the right bite mark. Sasuke didn't respond for a second and Karin wondered briefly if he was refusing to let her treat him, but then Sasuke's teeth grazed into her skin and Karin bit her lip to keep from crying out. Her chakra swirled and responded, feeding into him.

"I'm not a medic nin, but it's the best we can do for the moment." She said forcing a smile.

Sasuke's eyes wavered as he sat back. Medic nin. Sakura...Brows furrowed, he scoffed at himself. Sakura wasn't here. He had intentionally pushed them both away. Naruto...

Karin watched the expressions on his face flicker. For someone who wasn't very expressive, his eyes gave him away at the moment, widening and lowering at different intervals. Sasuke looked exhausted, dark blurry splotches beneath them. He was being driven by something, something that was trying to kill him, if her observations were correct. _He doesn't want to be here with me, _it occurred to her._ He's angry with me. He's regretting Team Taka. Maybe he's regretting taking me in the first place, _Karin thought self consciously.

"I'm sorry-" Karin began, but Sasuke interrupted.

"Can you get us out of here?" Sasuke was nothing but business as he eyed the place around them.

Karin bit her lip. She debated lying, but he would see right through that in a minute. She adjusted her glasses.

"Given time? Yes. But-"

"Do it." Sasuke ordered cutting her off.

Karin's eyes narrowed a fraction. Well, if ever there was a time to grow a spine... "No" She replied firmly.

"No?" Sasuke returned, eyes dark as he looked at her.

"At least...not yet" Karin replied. "Your chakra is so low, I could defeat you at this moment, and we have no idea where we will end up, even if we can break out." Karin told him.

_Plus how often do I ever get to be alone with you..._

It had started with sheer physical attraction. And Karin could handle that about herself, about him. She was comfortable with that, had been comfortable with people being attracted to her simply for her looks for years now since Orochimaru had gone and fucked up her life by experimenting on her. Karin had risen her way among the ranks by determination. She had used everything within her arsenal to rise from experimentee to experimenter. Karin liked control. So it wasn't surprising when things changed between Sasuke and her. She could feel it, like a sixth sense. She had seen his looks at her, looks he thought he'd hidden when he thought she wasn't looking. Looks, emotions even, that were unveiled in his gaze Sasuke might be able to control his actions, but really, his eyes gave him away. It was what she found in them, what she found in herself that she began to grow incomfortable with.

It was more than lust. It was more than a silly crush, or something she had to hit and quit to get it out of her system. Sasuke was a cancer, overtaking, and overcoming her attempts to thwart him, to thwart this, this helplessness she felt at his unbarred look. He cared for her. And that was difficult to process though she craved it, secretly coveted it, beneath her barbed wire cool faced exterior.

"Find the exit." Sasuke ordered, and then began to choke.

"Be realistic, Sasuke. Can you even summon your sharingan?" Karin said, grabbing his arm to stabilize him.

He shook it off, and she sighed.

"You're in no condition to be taking off. We're safe here for the moment and we can regain our chakra and come up with plan." Karin told him, releasing him and hugging her knees as she took a look around at the blackness surrounding them.

Sasuke sighed, his lungs hurt, his body still ached from his tremendous ambush with the kages. As much as it chagrined him, she was right. They were better off here for the moment. But Sasuke didn't want to hang around until Madara got back. The man had saved his life, a debt Sasuke didn't want to linger around to repay. He sighed, leaning forward, resting his elbows on his knees. He glanced at Karin. Red hair and red eyes blazing she looked at the blackness with a small smile on her face. _She's rather...nice. When she's quiet. _Sasuke's stray thought surprised him.

Realizing his gaze, she flushed, pushing her glasses up.

"What?" Karin asked him.

"You're happy about this. It makes it hard to trust you." Sasuke retorted, turning away from her, uncomfortable. He didn't want to be here alone with her. The last time they were alone, Karin had tried to come on to him. He had blown her off. So why was this any different? Sasuke was irritated by his lack of answer. They had things to be doing.

"Can you blame a girl?" Karin replied with a whimsical smile. "Lost in some alternate universe, with you. All alone." Karin said eyes starry as she was lost in some day dream.

Sasuke half sneered. Karin sighed.

"I was joking." She replied half heartedly a little put out by his expression. Sasuke's expression didn't change. "I'm working on getting us out of here as we speak but it's difficult because this entire place is made of chakra."

Sasuke sighed, raking a trembling hand through his mussed bangs. He caught Karin staring at him from beneath veiled lashes, and she turned the moment he caught her eye.

He quirked a glance at her.

_I'm smiling because there's no one I'd rather be here with _Karin thought inwardly answering the searching question in his eyes. But that was too vulnerable, too real, so she replied instead.

"I was scared. So scared that you were dead, that the kage's were going to kill you." Karin confessed.

"Karin-" Sasuke began.

"I care what happens to you Sasuke. We all do" Karin interjected.

He stiffened.

Karin felt the rejection like a backhand to the face. Bruised, shocked, she pulled herself together.

"I get it. You don't have a heart. You're too cold and too given over to hatred to feel anything. But you saved me, not once but twice. You try to act like you don't care, but you would have let Amaterasu consume me, if you didn't." Karin replied, hurt making her speak more plainly.

"and what if I told you that you reminded me of a former comrade? That the entire reason I picked you was simply because of your abilities and the fact that you reminded me of her? What if I told you that I formed a team simply to kill my brother and that I planned to leave you all, after it?"

"It wouldn't matter." Karin replied firmly.

Sasuke's eyebrow arched in surprise.

"It doesn't matter because I'm not her, and you know that or you wouldn't have picked me. I know who you're talking about because Orochimaru was convinced that they would come to the labs at some point and wanted everyone familiar with them in case." Karin told him. "I'm nothing like her, and that appeals to you." Karin informed him.

"You neglected to tell me this" Sasuke said, obviously about the Orochimaru peace. He wasn't comfortable addressing her other concern.

"You never asked." Karin replied with a shrug. "There's a lot you don't know, Sasuke." Karin replied with a shrug.

Sasuke was...intrigued. Very few people could speak to him like that. Fewer people who could speak to him like that and live. But it was Karin's attitude about it that intrigued him. She was non partial about it. She wasn't being arrogant, simply point of fact. Karin was more down to earth than he had realized.

"Don't look so put out. That's why you have me on this team and I'm happy to be of service. And for the point, you didn't leave us when you could have." Karin pointed out.

Sasuke closed his eyes. He had remembered what it had been like to have a team and had decided they were worth saving, worth risking his life for. That startled him. She was worth saving, worth risking his life for...

"If I didn't have my skills, then I'd be useless to you, and that's worse than all of the things you just said." Karin told him.

Sasuke was further startled by that.

_I won't be useless to you. I won't be dead weight. I may not be as powerful as the others are, but I'm still useful to you, and that's what matters, _Karin thought.

Karin met his gaze openly. Unashamedly. Briefly, Sasuke could see, could feel the countenance change. She and Sakura were night and day in that regard. Sakura could never look him in the eye. Would never touch him, too afraid of his reaction unless there was danger. Karin wasn't afraid of him. Karin touched him daily, making excuses to find a reason to do so. So why had he tolerated it? Sasuke was...surprised by her depth of feelings by the shadow of what he thought he knew about the girl in front of him. But that irritated him. Karin could be so dense and annoying sometimes.

"And what about my revenge?" Sasuke asked her, figuring since they had time he might as well ask the questions that were bothering him about the red haired enigma in front of him.

"I'm with you." Karin replied firmly as if it were obvious.

"_Really_?" He asked her, expression carefully guarded, though his tone contained mild interest.

"Yes. It's understandable given what all has happened." Karin replied with a shrug.

"It makes no sense whatsoever, given all that has happened. I'm throwing away my brother's sacrifice to destroy it all. To destory everything he ever cared about." Sasuke retorted, tone almost snappish. He was bitter, almost sulking if Karin had to put her finger on it.

"You wouldn't be doing this if it made no sense." Karin told him.

Sasuke's eyes widened. Her irresolute faith in him frustrated him, shook him. He hadn't asked for her to do this, to be like this. He wasn't comfortable with it. He had thrown off his bonds so many years ago and to become entangled into others was not on his agenda.

"And how do you know that?" Sasuke asked her, challenging her.

"By your actions. You may not have your plan entirely figured out, Sasuke and you may not know what you want, but the fact is still fact. You're your own man, refusing to be manipulated by others." Karin replied.

"Chee" Sasuke scoffed. It was easier to dismiss her compliments then to accept them. For to accept them said something entirely different about him...about her.

"What?" Karin replied with an eyebrow arch.

"So far I've allowed for Madara to use me to further his own plans. Is that the refusal to be manipulated?" Sasuke replied almost sullenly.

"Is that what this is about?" Karin retorted with a snort. "Have you lost your gumption Sasuke?"

Sasuke's black eyes stared into hers at the use of the word_. Really? _The sarcasm rolling off his expression right now was priceless.

"So what? You've been beat the past few battles you've had. So what, you're having problems? We knew this wasn't going to be easy. And you're getting stronger each time. Look at your last battle, Sasuke, you're on kage level!"

Sasuke's look was considering. He hadn't thought of it that way, though he wasn't exactly an optimist to start with. He had taken a kage's arm off. He had nearly defeated him were it not for the others interference.

"Sasuke?" Karin frowned, moving closer to check his vitals again. Those slender hands, two fingers made their way to his neck, warmth emanating from her entire being. Black eyes lowered, almond shaped as her touch connected, sending an explosion beneath his skin. Fire lit, ignited where she touched.

His heartbeat picked up, and Karin frowned, shifting closer. Then she saw his eyes, those dark eyes blazing. Blazing for her. Looking at her. Like she was something beautiful, sexy, enchanting andf tempting. His hand trailed up smoothly, resting on the side of her glasses and her face. What was Sasuke doing?

It had started with curiosity. He hadn't seen her take off her glasses since the first time he'd found her in the cave. Sasuke wanted to see what she looked like now. His memory of that moment was clouded, faded as his knowledge of the research specialist in front of him. What he thought he knew about her, what he did know about her. It seemed he had underestimated her worth to team taka and he thanked his lucky stars that he'd thought to bring her along anyways.

Karin's mouth went dry. He took off the glasses slowly, torturingly slowly. Red eyes held his own, as a cherry blush dusted it's way across her features.

_Desire_. She shivvered, eye lids lowered. Sheer lust. Sasuke was looking at her, looking at her, the direction of his gaze was her, on her, _about _her, for her. Adrenaline shot through her, raced through her as she shivvered again under the heat from that black gaze. Sasuke shifted closer, taking in every detail of her appearance, feeding off of her reaction to him. Sasuke had never considered, had never pursued any sort of intimate feeling, any intimate action. In his past he had run from them, done everything in his power to get rid of it. But this was... different..... in a way that he found he couldn't entirely explain. Something drew him in, something about her drew him in, and it wasn't entirely physical. But the physical was overpowering whatever logic he had left. And she was a curious sort of thing. He was just a boy in that regard though he had lived more life times then he cared to recall. Her eyes went to half mast, staring at him with confusion as her black eyelashes fluttered.

He loved it, feeding off the power her look and actions gave him. He had known he was attractive, but it had never occurred to him that he could make woman feel like this. Or maybe it was simply Karin. She was his to start with, had made that clear over their time together and he rather liked having someone in possession that was entirely his own. The possessiveness, and the safety that came with that heady knowledge, the ability to make her pause with a simple look. He drew closer, loving the tiny reactions she was giving him and her own subtle body movements that moved her closer to the heat. Close enough to get burned. Karin didn't care. _Burn baby burn._ She thought as he leaned forward, eyes taking in every twitch and response of the supple woman in front of him.

His lips, chapped lips met hers in a kiss that was barely a kiss, but burned it's way down her throat and down to her soul. He was tainting her, she thought as he kissed her again, black eyes like the charcoal of a fire as he grew bolder. _Taint me, make me yours._ She pleaded with those sooty lashes. Sasuke wrapped those calloused hands around her waist, settling on her lower back, pulling her closer to him as those hands dipped beneath her shirt, to feel and touch her skin. Karin more than obliged, drawing closer, a hand snaking behind his head, as the other was on his bare chest touching, experiencing toned pale flesh eliciting almost a gasping hiss from him as he stared at her.

Sasuke hadn't realized that the feeling was mutual. That those hands could feel so damn good on him, and that she was burning to the touch, burning him causing little fires to burn beneath the skin. He met her look as they paused, exchanging erratic breaths. And then her smile grew coy, smug even.

She _liked_ that. She liked the way his grip, his gaze, his breath was trying to smother her in it's intensity in this second. The strongest heat was always found in the coals at the end, Karin thought, drowning in obsidian, as liquid fire began to course it's way beneath her skin, as Sasuke took charge. _Sasuke, kissing me, Sasuke touching me_. Karin was giddy, love drunk at the feelings caressing her beneath her skin.

Sasuke gasped into the kiss when he felt her tongue lick a trail at the entrance of his lips, begging entrance. Sasuke opened his mouth in the gasp, and Karin needed no encouragement. Her tongue caressed his own, and things grew darker, hotter as the fire between them blazed. Hands touched, kneaded skin as they explored each other, Sasuke with darker ambition then he had previously thought possible.

"Sasuke.." Karin whispered, nearly panting it, making the curve of his smile smugger still. Crimson Sharingan, bedroom eyed as they were filled with clouded desire stared back at her.

_I could drown in them, in him_ Karin thought briefly, without a single regret. She would happily burn, with him, only him.

Realizing her pointed look, Sasuke realized the Sharingan had activated on it's own. His hands slowly released their hold of her. He had enough chakra now. Blinking, readjusting his gaze to the world around him, he knew how to break out of here now.

Karin sighed as he lost focus, releasing her own hold on his neck and back, and began examining the place around them. She readjusted her shirt, fluffing her hair as she grabbed her glasses, placing them back on as she straightened her shirt getting the wrinkled out of it.

She stood up, stretching and shaking her mane of red spiky hair, a feature Sasuke was more turned on about than he liked.

Karin smirked. "Shall we?" She asked him. He nodded.

"Take my hand" Sasuke told her.

"Sure thing" Karin practically purred, interlacing his hand in her own. Sasuke sighed. Whatever he had just started...he was in for it.


End file.
